Spot Welding Eye Safety Without Slowing Down

When
you’re working with an enormously hot and bright flame, it makes sense to want
adequate protection. Protecting yourself from getting burned is a good start,
but there’s more to it than that.

You don’t want your protection to get in the way of your work. Neither do you want to come home with your eyes feeling dead tired. In other words, you want protection that’s scalable to different tasks, whether you’re doing flux core welding, TIG welding, or anything between.

When
you’re doing amateur work for a couple of minutes at a time, you probably don’t
need anything more than an old-school, standard welding helmet. But for people
working professionally and welding constantly throughout the day, it’s more
important that your equipment can help you without hindrance.

It
would be an exaggeration to say the 3M Speedglas Welding Helmet makes it feel
like you’re not wearing a welding helmet at all. But that’s the general idea. The headband is made to fit heads 19.5” to
25.5” in diameter.

Once
you’ve got it on, it moves up and down with a pretty smooth pivot action, and
allows you to lock the front shield in the upper position. Moreover, 3M uses
some smartly placed exhaust vents that help reduce humidity and heat, and
fogging of the filter.

Build & Design

As
far as appearances go, the 3M Speedlas is fairly non-distinct. The plain gray
and black body looks neat and professional. Generic looking equipment is
exactly what many people are looking for, though there’s something to be said
for customizing your gear.

The
9100 Series was made with a 1.8 x 3.7-inch display, which provides a viewing
area of about six square inches. It’s a fairly wide field of view intended to
provide maximum protection with minimal obstruction to your vision.

The
screen is built around a pair of three sensors, which are used to activate an
auto-darkening filter in response to bright light. That automatic filtration
supports variable lens control between 5-13, which helps you maintain almost
perfect clarity without having to swap your helmet.

The lens can switch from light to dark in a tenth of a millisecond, which is 1/10,000th of a second. The filter will return to light in about a quarter of a second, an almost unnoticeable response time. That also ensures the helmet can respond to flares in an instant.

Battery Performance

The
included battery is supposed to operate for 2,800 hours. That translates into
more than an entire year of 40-hour workweeks spent with a welding torch in
your hand.

If
that sounds longer than you’d otherwise expect, it’s because the helmet operates
with a pair of CR2030 batteries instead of using a single battery cell. When it does run out, it’s worth noting these
batteries are relatively inexpensive and easy to find.

Other Considerations

This
helmet does not include side windows. Though you can get a magnifying lens, a
lens is not included. You do, however,
receive a helmet bag, and the clips necessary to attach your own magnifier
lens.

Who Should Choose the 3M Speedglas Welding
Helmet?

As
long as you end up with a properly sized helmet, this is the kind of equipment
that could easily convert someone into becoming a lifelong fan. It reduces
tunnel vision, and the venting ensures you don’t feel like you’re stuffed
inside of oven.

It’s
got switching speeds sufficient for protecting your eyes from fatigue and
safety hazards. From spot welding on through, the filtration is intended to be
suitable for almost anything you could throw at it.

Though it’s not the prettiest welding helmet on the market, it can take some strain off your neck without interfering with the quality of your work. And that’s easy to fall in love with.